August 2024
Today, our Board President Shanah Ahmadi, offers us a Tool of the Trade for our blog:
If you are reading this post, then you are likely a parent or a teacher—maybe you have the good fortune of being both. You have likely experienced how parenting and teaching can bring buckets of joy, success, and celebration. Or, alternatively, you have probably had the sensation that you are drowning in a bucket of despair, worry, and ineffectualness. This spectrum of feeling seems unavoidable when deeply caring for children is involved; furthermore, this dissonance between highs and lows may be a valuable aspect of caring for children.
Steiner indicated that challenging work is necessary for self-development. In the following excerpt, he provided this beautiful verse to eurythmy teachers, as a way for them to convey to the students the relationships between themselves and the world.
The wishes of the soul are quickened,
The deeds of the will wax and grow,
The fruits of life are ripening.
I feel my fate,
My fate finds me.
I feel my star,
My star finds me.
I feel my aims,
My aims find me.
My soul and the world
Are one.
Life will be clearer round me,
Life will be heavier for me,
Life will be richer in me.
In other translations of this verse, the word “heavier” is replaced with “harder” or “arduous”. It seems that Steiner conceived that hardship could bring bounty to our inner lives, and we all
seem to believe this idea on some level. We often find the silver lining in a situation after the
arduousness is over. This retrospection seems helpful, but I wonder about the myriad benefits of changing our attitudes in the midst of the challenge. When everything seems to be going wrong, how can we find the wisdom to remember that something about the situation is exactly what we need?
If you are waiting for an answer from me in this post, then let me gently disengage you from that hope. I am asking myself this question, and I will only be able to answer it for myself. Similarly, I urge you to ponder this question to yourself because you are the only person in the world capable of answering it.
If you are riding a high moment with the children in your life, then relax and enjoy the view that is offered to you. Notice how far you have come to reach this pinnacle and be grateful for this perspective. If you are plumbing the depths right now, then experiment with methods for finding your way through this heaviness. Maybe try letting the experience wash over you—let it sculpt you from the outside. Instead, perhaps try bringing a sense of clarity or a lifted feeling or an intensified will. Whatever and however you try, my only suggestion is that you practice Loving the act of trying.